


The Stuff of Legend

by orphan_account



Category: Doctor Who, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Crossover, F/F, Gen, Wholock
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-02-12
Updated: 2012-06-26
Packaged: 2017-10-31 01:31:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/338410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sally Donovan gets a new job, Molly Hooper trains a new recruit, Irene Adler meets a new client and then all hell breaks loose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Beginning

**Author's Note:**

> All my thanks to Nym (tumblr user aradiadelosmuertos, or Tarradiddlet here) for beta-ing, coping with my terribly inconsistent writing and generally being awesome.
> 
> The title is a direct quote from Donna Noble. ("Maybe not the stuff of legend, but every bit as important as Time Lords.")

The press release document in front of her was still blank. The cursor on the screen was blinking just out of tempo with the second hand on the clock, so that every twenty seconds or so, for three or four ticks, they were almost perfectly synchronized - but then it fell apart, again and again and again, and Sally Donovan was left more distracted than ever. 

Her cell phone rang.

_Didn’t I turn that off?_ She thought, pressing her fingertips to her temples.  _I’m sure I did._ It’s for personal calls only, after all, and she  was  a professional. She let it go to voicemail. She was about to start typing–  begin with a nice, technical sentence, try not to take up more words than you have to –

Ring.

Ring.

Ring.

“Oh, fuck it.” She picked it up. “Donovan.”

“Hello, Sgt. Donovan, my name’s Gwen Cooper. Tell me, have you ever heard of Torchwood?” The voice was female, and had an accent Sally couldn’t immediately place.

“Sorry? I didn’t catch that.”

“Torchwood. Have you heard of it?”

“No, I haven’t.” Sally’s fingers flew over the keyboard. When a simple internet search didn’t turn up anything except a few old news articles, she searched the Police database – and immediately got a request for I.D.  “What is it?”

“Don’t bother searching for it in your computer, you won’t find it. We’ve been doing some P.R. maintenance.”

“Is it something I should know about?” She tucked the phone more securely between her shoulder and her ear. “Is it a threat?”

“Not a threat, no.” Welsh, Sally realized, the woman’s accent was Welsh. Sally mentally kicked herself for not recognizing that earlier. “I’m part of Torchwood, and we were wondering if you would consider relocating. Very exciting. Lots of important stuff. Aliens.”

“I’m sorry, but did you just tell me that there would be  aliens involved? And I must have misheard you, because that sounded like you were offering me a job.”

“Aliens are very real, Sally Donovan. And we need your help.”

“Why me?”

There was a hesitant pause. “Why not you? We’ve looked at your work and we like what we see. Do we need another reason to hire another competent person with experience in the field?”

“I’m going to have to check this Torchwood out, you realize.”

“Ask Lestrade. He knows. We contacted him.”

“How did you convince  him ? He wouldn’t recognize anything as alien if it did a dance in front of him! You haven’t even convinced  me , for God’s sake!”

“Come on, Sally. You know we already have. As for Lestrade, well, we know someone who occupies a minor position in the government. He knows Lestrade rather well, as I understand it. My boss is quite jealous.”

The clock showed 5:30. A cubicle over, Anderson was getting his coat. “Can I call you back?”

“Lestrade will give you our number.”

Click.

Well. She stood up and stretched her legs. Anything to get away from the bloody press release.

She poked her head around the door to Anderson’s cubicle.  “Catch up with you later, yeah? I’ve gotta go speak to the boss a bit.”  He looked up.

“Yeah. See you later.” She left.

“Lestrade? Can I have a word?” He took his feet off the desk and had the decency to look embarrassed.

“Yeah?”

“Something called Torchwood called me just now, they said they want me for a job, said they’d called you first. You heard anything about it?”

“Oh, bloody hell.”

“That’s a yes, then?”

“Yeah, I’ve heard of them. Met up with them in one of those odd murders a few years back - do you remember them? Might’ve seen the papers, some kind of glowing boils left on the bodies. Came right in and made a right mess of the scene. Bloody Torchwood.”

“Don’t like them very much, then, do you?”

“No love lost when they went away, I’ll tell you. They did solve the case though, I’ll give them that.”

“Would you prefer I turn their offer down?”

“Doesn’t sound like I’ve got much choice about it, actually. If Torchwood wants you, Torchwood gets you, that’s what I’ve heard.”

“Don’t I get a choice?”

“Of course, it’s your choice, I’m just not allowed to say that you’re a bloody fantastic Sergeant and I’d rather keep you in my squad.”

“Thanks, boss.”

“Are you going to take the job?”

“They said aliens were involved. Lestrade, there’s no such thing as aliens, right? Don’t tell me my nephew’s been right because I will  never  hear the end of that.” He didn’t say anything. “You’ve got to be bloody kidding.” He shook his head. “Oh,  fuck .”

“I should tell you off for swearing,” he said, leaning forward onto his elbows, “but that’s  exactly what I said.”

“I’ve got to take it.”

“I figured you’d say that.”

She tilted her head. “You did?”

“I’ve got you booked on a train to Cardiff tomorrow morning.”

“I don’t know whether to hug you or slap you.” She grinned widely. Then stopped. “Wait, did you say Cardiff?”  


~***~

  
Molly Hooper stood over a dead body. She zipped up the body bag and took off her gloves. The door opened.   
  
“Hooper?” Her supervisor strode in, leading a woman - about Molly’s own age - in. “This is Martha Jones. Molly Hooper. Martha’s the new recruit I told you about. Show her around?” He was turning around, running a hand through his already very distressed hair.  “There’s some kind of scandal in I.T. that I’ve got to go deal with.” He left. The woman stuck out her hand – probably from habit, it wasn’t the sort of thing you usually did when someone had until just now been poking at a dead body.  
  
“Hi.”  
  
“Hi. I’m Molly Hooper. I mean, I know you knew that already, but... yeah.” She shook the proffered hand.  
  
“Martha Jones, again, obviously.” They stood like that for a bit, awkwardly, until Molly brightened up. “I guess I’d better show you around, then.”  
  
“Yeah, sure.” Martha followed her as she went to wash her hands.  
  
“Do you mind me asking – why the morgue? It’s not most peoples’ first choice of profession,” Molly asked.  
  
“Med school doesn’t pay the bills,” Martha laughed, a bit self-consciously. “I mean, I’m already an M.D.; I’m doing Paramedic training now.”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Yeah, I need it for work.”  
  
“I thought being a doctor was considered doing pretty well for yourself, I mean, they always need more doctors, don’t they?”  
  
“I’m not looking for work as a doctor. I was, but that changed.”  
  
“Changed? Changed how?”

“A hundred things happened all at the same time. My priorities got shifted around.”

“What happened? Did you meet someone?”  
  
“You could say that. It’s a bit complicated, actually. Long story, and all that.”  
  
“I can do complicated.” It wasn’t a lie, either.  Faking someone’s death isn’t an easy feat.

“Maybe later.” Martha’s smile looked a bit sad.

“Sorry, it’s none of my business. I didn’t mean to pry, I just - “

“Yeah, it’s fine, just - later.”  
  
It was quite a bit later that night when they saw each other again, bleary-eyed and still half-asleep, at the morgue. Their supervisor was livid.  
  
“I trust you to make sure that this place is sanitary and secure. We’ve got a medical emergency and I’ve only got two lousy morgue attendants to try and clear this thing up. Mr. Smyth’s body, the one on your list? His widow says you’ve done something to his face. Did you give her the wrong body? Did you screw with his body? I expected better than this from you, Molly Hooper, especially after that bloody  detective was gone.”  
  
“Sir, I’m sorry, but I’m absolutely  positive it’s Mr. Smyth. All the other bodies are accounted for.”   
  
“Right. Well, his body’s on the table upstairs, you’ll have to go verify that.  If you can’t figure out what’s going on, the Mrs. is prepared to sue. You had better bloody well straighten this thing out.” He threw his hands up in exasperation and went off to talk to Mrs. Smyth.  
  
Molly looked at Martha and was shocked to see that Martha looked relatively unperturbed by this unexpected disruption from the norm – and on her first day of work.  
  
“Where do we start?” Martha asked. “Is there a procedure, or...?”  
  
“Procedure. Right, procedure. Got that.” Molly snapped out of her daze and went into autopilot. “Check our records, make sure it wasn’t just an oversight, check all the other bodies to make sure there aren’t any other mix-ups – we’ve got photos of all the other bodies from when they were first brought in, so that won’t be difficult – why don’t you start with that? I’ll get the paperwork.”  
  
Martha nodded and walked off towards the positive temperature cold chamber, where the rest of the bodies on their list were. Molly turned back towards the office, where the files were kept. “O-kay, then.” 

~***~

  
Irene watched the blonde woman arrive at her door from inside her bedroom - her own, not the one she used for clients. She checked her makeup and stood up, picking up her riding crop on the way out. She watched from the shadows of the top floor, taking care not to lean too far over the railing. She didn’t want to be seen, not just yet. Kate led the woman to the second-floor bedroom, passing through the metal detectors she’d installed - discretely, of course, and with a few unusual customizations.  
  
The room that Kate led the blonde woman to was tastefully – and expensively – furnished. The bed was large, with strong brass posts at the headboard and smaller ones at the foot.  

She watched Kate close the door and leave.   
  
Barely two minutes later Irene approached, the sound of her high heels hitting the floor clipping the silence into carefully-measured chunks. The heel of her riding crop traced a lazy path up the outside of her thigh. She picked up the card that Kate had left on the small table outside.  River Song. She spared it a quick glance before entering, her stride never faltering. “Have you been very naughty, Ms. Song?” She put her hand on the bedpost. If she was less experienced than she was, she might have been surprised that her client wasn’t already on the bed. As it was, she’d seen everything. Some liked to make an entrance, prove themselves  different than anything she’d seen before. But it got tiresome. Nothing surprised her anymore.  
  
River Song stepped out from behind the screen, still very much dressed. “Oh yes,” she said, winking. She reached behind her, into her belt. Irene had thought she’d seen everything. The gun that River drew and pointed directly at her heart told a different story. 

“That’s my gun.” She reached behind her, towards the dresser, and found that the latch on it was broken.

“Couldn’t resist. I was going to use this - ” River held up a thin tube - Irene supposed it was lipstick, although she sincerely doubted that it was  _just_ that - “but then I found this and, well, guns are  so  much more fun to play with.” River grinned.  
  
Irene might not have seen this before, but that didn’t mean that she was surprised, or at all out of her league. On the contrary. What had been shaping up to be an ordinary job had just gotten several times more exciting.  
  
“I’ve got questions. Either you answer them and do as I say, or you’ll die. I don’t mean one of those pesky disappearing acts you’ve pulled recently, either. I mean I’m going to take this gun and put a bullet through the very centre of your heart.” River smiled confidently.

Irene knew she should be afraid. She knew that she should do  something , call for Kate, bluff, something to get out. But strangely, she wasn’t, and she stayed where she was. Instead, she found herself smiling.  
  
“Oh, I think I’m going to  _love_ you.”


	2. The Plot Thickens

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Guns are pesky, Cardiff is actually important and morgues don't need to be saved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Neither the characters nor the universe belong to me, I just like playing with them.

Irene wasn’t afraid, even when River pulled the gun from her dress. This was just another game to play.   
  
Irene Adler had never lost a game.   
  
“You said you have questions. If you’ve come to  me , that means only one thing - you can’t find the answers anywhere else. Nobody comes to me for a preliminary round of questioning. And if I’ve got the answers, well - I certainly don’t think that pointing a gun at my head is going to be very effective, do you?” She took a step forward, trying to make it seem natural. River didn’t move.   
  
“That’s a lot of guessing games, Miss Adler. I’m a desperate woman with a desperate question and a loaded gun. I’m the one who’ll be making the biggest gambles in this game.”   
  
“Is that so?” She took another step forward. River readjusted her aim. “Guns are so pesky, don’t you think? They get in the way of real conversation. Of course, I can think of a couple other things you could do with that gun.” She grinned slowly. She was taking a huge chance about River’s preferences here, but she knew immediately that she was right - River’s eyes darted away from her for a split second, surprised.   
  
Irene didn’t waste the opportunity. She grabbed the gun and kicked it away. She had planned to take River down, knock her to the floor and pin her there, but River was ready, and somehow ended up on top of her. Still, Irene couldn’t find it in her to be scared. This didn’t feel like danger.   
  
“This is more like how I’d imagined my evening would go,” Irene joked, hooking her legs around River knees and flipping them over. She let go, stood up, and offered a hand to River, who didn’t take it  _ ( smart girl )  _ but got up by herself. “Now,” Irene said, dusting herself off. “let’s have some tea and talk about why you thought it was a good idea to pull a gun on a dominatrix.”   
  
Kate brought the tea, looking surprised and a little impressed. Irene took hers black with no sugar. River refused to drink.   
  
“Alright, River Song. You’ve had your fun, you’ve played with my guns and you’ve managed to leave my bedroom without taking off your clothes. Impressive. You could, obviously have just asked your questions, but you chose to threaten me with my own weapon and wrestle me to the ground.” She paused. “I like the way you think, so I am going to answer your questions. Where do you want to start?”   
  
“I think you’ll find that the wrestling was your idea. I just went along with it.”   
  
“Oh, don’t start flirting now, I just put my dressing gown back on! Come on, what are these very important questions?”   
  
River leaned forward. “Are you aware that you’ve been spreading an alien pathogen all the way to the Dundra System?”   
  
“I’m sorry?” Irene kept her face carefully blank.   
  
“You know what I’m talking about. You can find people in every corner of the universe that have heard of Irene Adler, if you look hard enough. They know about the human will provide special services tailored precisely to every species.”   
  
“I see. Well, I won’t deny that some of my clients have rather, shall we say, unique needs? What was the part about an alien pathogen? I’m quite clean, I get checked every month.”   
  
“By a human doctor, I presume?”   
  
“Of course. He’s the best in his field.”   
  
“But he is still, unfortunately, human, and quite blind to the fact that you’re the carrier for an infection that has been causing deaths all the way out to the Dundra System.”   
  
“Deaths?” Irene heard her voice become suddenly quite distant. Her ears began to ring.   
  
“People are dying, Irene Adler. There’s no way to cure them. And they all come back to you.”   
  
~***~

  
The first thing that Sally Donovan learned about when she got to Cardiff was that it was actually important. It figured. From what she’d heard about it, Torchwood had all of space and most of time to chose from, and they’d picked bloody Cardiff. When she wondered aloud about this, Gwen replied in clipped tones - Sally had forgotten that she was a local.   
  
“We’re charged to protect the British Isles from alien threats, Donovan. We can’t just set up base on Mars. Besides, there’s a giant rift in space and time running through the city. It made quite a lot of sense at the time.”   
  
The rest of the ride passed in slightly awkward silence. Gwen pulled the van up outside the Millenium Centre.   
  
“What, are we going to do some sightseeing before we run around catching aliens?”   
  
“Don’t be silly. This is it.”   
  
“What? A top-secret alien hunting organization in the Millenium centre? You’ve got to be joking.”   
  
“No, we don’t work in there. Our office is just out front.”   
  
“I don’t see it.” Sally stood in front of the centre, looking around. “I’m sorry, I can’t see how -”   
  
“Alien tech, remember?” Gwen replied, sounding exasperated. She grabbed Sally’s arm, pulling her around to stand on the sidewalk. “Stand just - here. Okay.” She pressed her headset to her ear. “Alright, Jack, I’ve got her.”   
  
The sidewalk began to move. It wasn’t one of the sliding ones that you had sometimes at airports. The slab of concrete began to sink into the ground. Oh.   
  
“Don’t people notice that the sidewalk disappears?” Sally asked.   
  
“There’s a perception filter around it. Nobody wants to notice, so nobody does.”   
  
“You’re going to have to explain that a bit more.” Sally replied, then immediately added “Later.” The hub was coming into view. The blue light from the computer screens faded into the too-orange light from the long, narrow lamps on the walls. Steel posts supported the high ceiling. Gadgets that she couldn’t even imagine the uses of were in glass cases along one wall.   
  
“We’ve built this thing basically back up from scratch. We were going to just leave it - there’s been some pretty incredibly dangerous and terrible stuff that happened around here, we were going to go back to normal jobs, this flirt over here,” she gestured to a man in a blue shirt and red suspenders “wanted to run it into the ground. But the aliens don’t stop when you want to retire, so we built it back up and it’s running again. My husband should be around here somewhere. Now, I have to go deal with a Weevil invasion, so I’m going to leave you at the mercy of Captain Jack Harkness. Don’t get too flattered, he’ll flirt with anything that has a face and a few things that don’t.” Gwen stepped off the platform, grabbed a couple of spray cans from a desk and stepped back on.   
  
“Off you get, then.” Sally jumped off, warily avoiding Jack’s offer of help.   
  
“Jack Harkness? Sally Donovan.” She shook his hand. “Don’t start flirting with me, I’m here to work, not meet the locals.”   
  
Jack raised his hands in a gesture of surrender. “I'm not exactly local.” He was American, Sally realized. “Besides, I only flirt with fully willing participants. One-sided flirting’s no fun.” He paused, and when Sally quirked one side of her mouth in what she supposed could pass for a smile, he slowly lowered his hands.   
  
“If you’re not going to slap me, there are some things I should probably show you.”   
  
Sally nodded. “First things first, though. Where’s the loo?”   
  
Five minutes later, Jack was showing her around the hub, quickly enough so that she almost had trouble keeping up.   
  
“Oh, and finally, down here are where we keep Weevils. Not nice, but not particularly nasty, either. They’re kind of like mice. Pests, but we’ve got pet names for ‘em anyways.”    
  
“What’s in there?” Sally peered down the dark hallway to the door at the end, which was slightly ajar. The blue-white light of a lit computer screen illuminated the doorframe.   
  
“That’s where we carry on side projects. Y’know, nothing huge or exciting, just the kind of stuff we want to know about. All the routine monitoring happens in the main room, along with all the official investigations. That’s where we research whatever it is that tickles our fancy.”   
  
Sally was about to ask exactly what kind of things would catch the fancy of top-secret government alien hunters, but was interrupted by a very average-looking guy carrying a toddler coming down the stairs.   
  
“Morning, Jack. This the new recruit?” He opened a cupboard door and started rummaging around.   
  
“Rhys, Sally Donovan. Sally, this is Rhys Williams, Gwen’s husband. And that’s Anwen, their daughter.”   
  
“Pleased to meet you, Sally.” He found what he was looking for in the cupboard - a box of nappies - “Gotta dash,” and left.   
  
Sally turned to Jack, but before she could get a single word out, he cut in. “Yes, Torchwood’s always like this. Welcome to the world where our records are shabby and pepper spray is in the same cupboard as the baby wipes.”   
  
Sally pursed her lips and nodded.   
  
~***~

  
Eight hours later, Martha and Molly were sitting in the St. Bart’s cafeteria, nursing extra-large coffees and trying not to fall asleep.   
  
“Martha?”   
  
“Hm?”    
  
“What the bloody hell is going on?”   
  
“Personally I’m hoping it’s a dream. It’s too early in the morning for national crises.”   
  
“Do you think it’s that bad?”   
  
“Nothing makes sense and we’re about to do an unscheduled double shift. It’s close enough. And, in my experience, anything that doesn’t make sense on this level usually turns out to be worthy of a crisis.”   
  
“What kind of not-making sense do you usually deal with?” Molly realized that she sounded almost rudely skeptical. “Sorry.”   
  
“It’s fine.” Martha yawned widely. “What time is it?”   
  
“It’s eight. We’ve got about half an hour until our proper shift starts.” Molly laid her head down on the table. “I do  _not_ want to deal with the dead guy’s wife.”   
  
Martha put down her coffee and grabbed Molly under her arms. “Okay, up you get Sleeping Beauty. We’ve got a morgue to save.”   
  
“It’s full of dead people. It doesn’t need to be saved.” Molly groaned, resisting Martha’s efforts to get her on her feet. “Okay, fine, the new recruit is beating me in the job enthusiasm contest. I’m getting up.” She tossed her paper coffee cup in the rubbish bin and followed Martha up to the morgue.   
  
“Molly?”   
  
“Yeah?”    
  
“I’m pretty sure the guy on table number four had a beard before we went for breakfast.”   
  
“Don’t be silly, it’s not like someone came in and shaved him.”   
  
“No, but - look, he doesn’t look like his photo anymore. I get that we couldn’t find out what happened to Mr. Smyth, but what if that was still him, only  - he’d changed?”   
  
“Let me see table four.” She picked up the clipboard and glanced at the picture, then at the face of the body on the table. “What the -” She looked again. She poked her head out the morgue door  at the secretary down the hall. “OI, MARY.” She yelled. “DID ANYONE COME IN HERE AND PLAY WITH THE BODIES?”    
  
She closed to door slowly. “Okay, that’s really weird. Nobody except for us has been in here since midnight. Mary checked the card swipes.”   
  
“Molly? I think you had better come see this.” Martha was staring not at the corpse on table four, but on the one next to it - a woman in her eighties. Molly came over to stand next to Martha.    
  
“What is it?”   
  
“Just - watch.”   
  
Then Molly saw it. The flesh under the woman’s skin seemed to be bubbling slightly, stretching at the skin above it. And then, slowly, it began to fade. The woman’s hair began to go very white, falling onto the table in huge clumps without Molly even touching it - she was too scared to move. The woman became more gaunt, the flesh of her cheeks leaving, her jaw looking more and more pronounced. The change was so subtle she doubted she would have noticed if she hadn’t been looking between the body and the picture on the clipboard the whole time. The difference was unmistakable.   
  
“Martha?”   
  
“Yes?”   
  
“What the  hell is going on?”   
  
“I wish I could tell you.”


End file.
